Far Cry

"Not the most original game ever, but it executes the formula superbly."

I picked up Far Cry a year ago, and it was great. It was one of the most difficult games I had played in a long while, and also one of the most frustrating. It also was much longer than I had expected, taking me about a month to complete at a leisurely pace. It's a massive FPS, allowing a clever player multiple ways to complete most levels, and with a thoroughly immersive graphical/aural experience, it more than makes up for the abysmal story, and remains one of the most fun FPS games I've ever played.

Story: 4/10
The plot in this game is terrible. Jack Carver is an ex-Navy SEAL (or something) who now taxis people across the Pacific in his little boat to various islands. While taking a young woman to a small cluster of islands, Carver gets attacked, and takes refuge on one of the destination islands. With nowhere else to go, he makes it his goal to rescue Valerie Whats-her-face. The island is inhabited by an evil genius named Kreiger, and Carver is aided by a rogue scientist named Doyle. Carver must hop across islands and mow down hundreds of mercenaries, not to mention mutants created from Kreiger's genetic experiments to rescue Valerie and destroy Kreiger's evil plans. A real thriller, no? Don't worry, whatever semblance of an attempt to hold the plot together is removed by the ridiculous lines that both Carver and the Bad Guys spout out: "I'M GONNA SHOOT YOU IN THE FACE!" and "I'M SO PISSED OFF I DON'T CARE IF THEY NOTICE ME!" I swear I'm not making that up. The plot (and the execution of the plot) is so hilarious that I couldn't help but give this at least a four, and the only reason that it's a four is because I don't think they meant it to be funny.

Graphics: 10/10
This is what Far Cry is known for, and damnit, even with Half-Life 2, Halo 2, and Doom 3 being out now, Far Cry is still hanging with them - even going beyond them in some aspects. For one, the draw distance is set at over a kilometer. Let me repeat that: the draw distance is set at over a kilometer. That's quite a long way - and you will put that to good use. There are scenarios in which you will be shooting gunships with a rocket launcher, where you are on the top of a mountain, and the ship is (obviously) in the water, while it is shooting rockets back at you. You will see utterly remarkable views of the entire level at points, and with your binoculars or sniper rifle, you can pick out individual enemies from a ways away. Furthermore, the game makes transitions from massive, sprawling outdoor environments to narrow catacombs and confined spaces almost seamlessly - and you'll be doing a lot of "dungeon-crawling" in this game, too. There are some pretty intense areas where you'll be battling Trigens (the mutant experiments) with a combat shotgun in a tiny, dark stairwell with one flickering light and a blood-stained wall, and it looks fantastic. Explosions look magnificent, from close-up and far away, the annihilation of an attack helicopter as it explodes in mid-air and then plummets into the water below is fantastic. And yes, the water looks fresher in Far Cry than any other game on the market.

From close up, the graphics aren't as good. The lush foliage of the tropical environment is great - huge thickets of trees, fields of tall grass, they look great, and it does look like you're in a jungle, that's good. The texture quality is pretty good - not Half-Life 2 quality, but still good. The grass looks pretty grassy, the dirt roads don't look like tan spraypaint, that sort of thing. The indoor textures are pretty good too, complete with rust, cracked walls, faded paint, and shiny surfaces. The only beef that I have about the graphics is the poor quality of the models. Granted, you won't be seeing enemies up-close that often, but when you see Carver talking, you won't like his ugly mug very much.

The other complaint that I have is the physics engine - and this isn't very graphical, but whatever. Crytek, I believe, coded this engine from the ground up when they churned out Far Cry, an action that really puts this small, unheard-of European development company on the map (most FPS games use a contortion of the Unreal or Quake engines). It's passable, but it's not fantastic, especially when dealing with the ragdoll physics. And here's what I mean: if you shoot some guy in the chest, his torso and limbs will go flailing about (which is expected)... but his legs will not move an inch. He will remain rooted in his spot, which is frustrating, because while they're running straight at you, a train will not stop them, and your puny automatic combat 12-gauge shotgun won't either. But most objects are mobile, and will at least wiggle when you body-check them. Or, you know, blow them up. Whatever.

Gameplay: 10/10
Let me get this out of the way, right now: Far Cry is hard. It is also rather long. Much like m... never mind. Anyway, the game contains 20 single-player levels, each of which will take a good half-hour, at least. That's not taking into account the fact that the last five or six levels can be harder than any other FPS you've played in the last few years. And this is on the normal difficulty. If this was a console game, I would have a veritable graveyard of ruined controllers. This isn't to say that it's ridiculous - the challenge lies almost entirely in the player's skill, or lack of it. There are multiple ways into most situations, and how you execute every single part of it will determine the outcome. On the first level, alone, you are instructed to steal a vehicle from an enemy camp. This camp has maybe 15 enemy mercenaries in it, and how you accomplish the objective is entirely up to you. You can try to sneak in and flee - but then you will be spotted when you get in the vehicle, and everyone will fire upon you. Plus, you won't get all the extra ammo and armor. You can stealthily try and eliminate all the enemies, or lure individual men into the jungle to become good friends with your machete. Or, of course, you can go in, guns blazing, and shoot all the bad guys and the conveniently located explosive barrels. Health is placed well - there's always a health kit before every big battle, and after most of them, so you usually don't have to go far with a sliver of health.

The checkpoint system adds to the suspense of the game. There are no free saves like in Half-Life 2, Call of Duty, and so on. There also aren't liberal checkpoints, like in Halo or Timesplitters 3. Instead, you get a checkpoint before every big battle, and after a string of smaller battles, so while you're not being stretched out too far, you still have to be careful. Every enemy can kill you quickly, so you can't take anything for granted. Well, except for the loser scientists with handguns, those guys suck.

The levels suffer from embarrassingly simple objectives, going along the Halo/Half-Life/Doom 3 formula of "go here, press this button, go there, press that button," etc, so while the depth of the objective is non-existent, the method of getting to your objective can be challenging and different. Every level has a different string of scenarios between you and your goal - on the first level, you go from an ancient catacomb to a small fishing outpost, to an enemy camp from which you steal a car, and then you go cruising down fresh beaches while being pursued by other vehicles and boats. Then, you thread through a small forest and cross a small gulf to enter an old Japanese carrier. The second level, which is the carrier, is claustrophobic, intense, and challenging, as you meander through a maze of small corridors, with enemies around every corridor. This is obviously quite different from the first level - welcome to Far Cry. Other levels that involve you being outside are quite different from the first, which is even better. Plus, you can only carry four weapons at a time, and these weapons carry from one level to the next, so what you choose for your weapon sets will affect your performance for the next several levels. Choose wisely!

The Trigens add a new, and difficult, twist to the game. Let me tell you, Trigens are freaking beasts. The first type you meet, mutated monkeys (I'm not making this up), will jump at you in a berserker rage and claw you to death in seconds, lopping off all of your health in one or two swipes. Plus, their ten-foot-long limbs (they look like they're two feet long, but I've tested this out - a minor gripe) make avoiding their attacks quite difficult, and their vast amount of health makes them even more threatening. Later you will fight mutated humans, including 8-foot-tall beasts with huge amounts of health and rocket launchers fused to their arms. They're called Cyberdem-- wait, wrong game, these are Fat Boys, and are even more threatening than their oddly-similar counterparts, Doom's Cyberdemon, because they're fast and much more aggressive. Combat between the Trigens and the mercenaries (the Trigens are berserk and attack all humans, they're supposed to be caged) makes for an even more intense, war-like environment.

The only real flaw here is multiplayer - frankly, it stinks. Modding is possible (an editor comes with the game! Too bad it crashes all the freaking time), but it takes a while. The multiplayer modes are clumsy, and the gameplay is pretty lame, because the levels are all far too huge considering the average size of a game isn't nearly enough. Plus, snipers dominate every single game, something great for all the sniper-types, but for the more close-quarter people like me, we're boned.

Sound: 10/10
"I'M GONNA SHOOT YOU IN THE FACE!"
"I GOT A PRESENT FOR YA!"
"YEAH, YEAH, YEAH!!"
"HOW DO YA LIKE THAT?!"

I'd end the section right there, but it doesn't seem right. Anyway, the music in this game is absolutely incredible, and the use of it is phenomenal. If you're sneaking through bushes, deciding when to ambush an unsuspecting group, the music is quiet but intense, with a quiet drum-line. When you finally drop in on them, the music bursts out in a loud blast of synthesized energy, and when an enemy helicopter comes charging toward you, the music changes again to something even louder and greater. I can't really describe it in words, but trust me, it's cool. The guns make their own, unique sounds, and they pack oomph. Plus, there's echoing in the proper places, an effect that doesn't seem to be used quite well enough in most games. The quotes at the beginning of this section are genuine lines from the mercenaries, which truly is the sole reason to give a 10 to the sounds.

Replay Value: 9/10
You don't really unlock anything when you finish the game, but that's okay. Aside from the option to make the game even more challenging (holy hell), the ability to handle each level differently alone makes playing the game 2 or 3 times worth it. Levels don't really play the same way twice, so you can play out a level the exact same way and have something different happen to you each time. Alternatively, you can simply go exploring. I played the 10th (or 11th, something around there) level again today, and rather than complete the objectives, I roamed around the small islands in my Humvee, climbed empty lighthouses, swam to distant islands to look for special goodies, etc. I had a good time.

Overall: 9/10
I have not enjoyed the single-player of FPS games in this way before. There are games that have equally good story modes (Half-Life 2, Timesplitters 3), but they're different from this one, and the experience is unique. The challenge of the game makes this game well worth the, what, $30 it goes for now? It's very difficult, and lengthy, and casual gamers will find themselves spending a month or more trying to complete the game. A better multiplayer mode would help a lot, but other than that, it is definitely worth a mighty nine. Buy this game! You'll love it.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 04/05/05